Max Allan Collins' Quarry Comes to Comics (Exclusive Preview)

Courtesy of Alex Ronald/Titan Comics

The crime novelist's assassin also featured in a Cinemax series last year.

It's one thing to accept payment to kill a man, but what if the target is someone you literally owe your life to? A new comic book series featuring Max Allan Collins' long-serving hit man Quarry intends to answer that question this November.

Quarry's War sees the former marine turned professional assassin have to deal with an unexpected face from his past, when his latest contract turns out to be someone he served with during the Vietnam War. Set early in the character's career, it's a rare chance to see Quarry before he became the killer audiences are more familiar with.

The series will be written by Collins himself, with art by Green Lantern, Spawn and Spider-Man veteran Szymon Kudranski. It also marks Collins' return to comics; the novelist's previous comic book projects include the first post-Frank Miller Batman issues and the Road to Perdition graphic novel that inspired the 2002 Sam Mendes movie.

Quarry's War follows last year's eight-episode Cinemax adaptation of the character. In prose, Quarry has been around since 1976, with Hard Case Crime taking over publication of the books in 2006 with The Last Quarry. (Seven titles have since been released, in addition to reissues of the earlier titles.)

"The excellent Cinemax Quarry TV series inspired me to delve more directly into the protagonist's Vietnam experiences," Collins told The Hollywood Reporter. "A graphic novel series, with its visual potential, was the perfect way to dig into the experiences that shaped Quarry."

The first issue of Quarry's War will be released digitally and in comic book stores Nov. 29. Before then, check out a preview of covers to the issue by Alex Ronald, Ricardo Drumond and Fay Dalton below, along with interior artwork by Kudranski.